


Crush

by stephanericher



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Baseball, M/M, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-07
Updated: 2017-05-07
Packaged: 2018-10-29 04:41:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10846674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stephanericher/pseuds/stephanericher
Summary: “You’re not subtle; Midorin’s just oblivious.”





	Crush

**Author's Note:**

> (im gonna stop noting this every time at some point but this is the baseball au with younger!touou!midorima--once more for 5/7)
> 
> val i am forever in your debt (including for creating this collection!!)

God, Midorima looks good in a Touou uniform, better even than Aomine had let himself imagine when he’d found out Satsuki had gotten Midorima to come here. Part of it’s that Aomine’s imagination, vivid or no, is no substitute for the real deal, but part of it is the way Midorima seems to get more attractive by the day, walking more confidently, setting his face in that adorably stubborn way. And boy, has Aomine got it bad; they’re a few weeks into living together and he doesn’t know how he’s going to survive the next two years. It can’t keep going, but every time Aomine thinks it can’t get any worse it does.

Midorima doesn’t even know what he’s doing most of the time; Aomine’s sure of that much. The way he pouts when he adjusts his tie in the mirror (and tells Aomine to do his properly—oh, Aomine’s already imagined Midorima doing it for him, soft fingertips brushing Aomine’s throat) or stands a little taller next to Aomine, accentuating his height advantage (which isn’t fair at all; Aomine’s so used to thinking of Midorima as small, the cute kid with chubby cheeks trailing after everyone in Aomine’s year, striving for their heights—and now he’s almost at the point where he can keep the pace. It’s that stupid sweet tooth, the shiruko he loves to drink and the honey in his tea, how diligent he is at studying even though you can be stupid and lazy and still manage decent grades at Touou if you sweet-talk the teachers enough. And that he’s not doing it to be cute, that he seems to have no idea how much it’s driving Aomine up the wall, how Aomine hasn’t been able to stop thinking about him since he’d first seen him take the mound for Teikou when Satsuki had dragged him to the middle school tournament, carrying the weight of being Teikou’s ace so gracefully on his shoulders and tossing a two-hitter, no walks and no runs.

Midorima frowns, redoing the buttons on the jersey.

“Does it look okay?”

Aomine almost tells him it looks cute, but holds his tongue (and, for a second, wonders if he should, if that’s not too far out of the realm of appropriate teasing for an upperclassman, but the moment passes).

“It looks weird?” says Midorima.

“No,” says Aomine. “You look good, Kid.”

He reaches over to ruffle Midorima’s hair; Midorima’s caught off-guard and doesn’t quite duck away in time. His hair is soft, his scalp warm under Aomine’s fingers, and Midorima almost seems to lean into Aomine’s touch, but then he jerks away. His cheeks are glaring, brighter red than his socks, and, oh, Aomine’s done this nearly every day Midorima’s been here but the effect hasn’t lessened at all yet (and it’s still so fucking cute; Aomine’s sure he’s never going to get tired of Midorima’s blushing face).

“Please don’t mess up my hair,” Midorima says, rapidly smoothing it over.

“You’ll be wearing a hat anyway,” says Aomine.

“Yes,” says Midorima. “Turned the correct way.”

“It’s a style,” Aomine says. “It looks good on me.”

Midorima does not refute that point, and Aomine tries very hard not to take a meaning that probably isn’t there—though he gets a subtle peek at Midorima’s ass in those black baseball pants before they leave and, well. Goddamn.

He sits down next to Satsuki in warmups, watching Midorima is almost unbearable, especially when it’s an unusually warm day for April. Satsuki always knows this shit; he doesn’t even have to start explaining, just bury his head in his hands.

“You’re overreacting, Dai-chan.”

“He’s so fucking adorable,” Aomine moans. “He asked me if his uniform looked all right. What was I supposed to say?”

“Yes?” says Satsuki, though what sounds like a half-laugh.

“Stop laughing at my pain!”

There’s footsteps on the dugout steps; Aomine looks up. It’s Midorima, of course; his jersey is still buttoned up the whole way and his hat is at a perfect forward-facing angle.

“Is everything all right?”

“Don’t worry, Midorin. Dai-chan’s just being melodramatic again.”

“Oh,” says Midorima (his cheeks color a little bit again, and Aomine wishes he could kiss them until they get as dark as they can).

“Sit with us!” Satsuki says, a little too brightly (Aomine’s really going to kill her for this).

She makes room between the two of them, and, okay—maybe he’ll wait to kill her after sitting next to Midorima, squished this tightly, because it could be heaven or hell. Midorima sits down, his thigh nearly touching Aomine’s, and Aomine has to fight the urge to scoot over and bridge that barely-millimeters-wide gap.

“You wore seven at Teikou, Midorin. Why the switch?”

Oh, yeah—there’s a bright red six on the back of his jersey, the first thing Aomine had noticed, right after his number five (but that had all flown out like a well-struck ball on a day the wind’s carrying the moment he’d noticed Midorima’s ass and legs in those pants).

“Um,” says Midorima, cheeks flaring again (will everything make him blush? Aomine’s not going to survive the next month, probably) as he glances at Aomine out of the corner of his eye, almost loss through the angle of the lenses on his glasses. “I.”

“It’s fine if there was no reason,” Satsuki says, in a voice that from her means she knows already, maybe has since before she’d asked.

Aomine frowns, leaning forward.

“I should go,” Midorima says. “Take some more flies. Excuse me.”

Aomine breathes out when he leaves, putting his hands up behind his head. “Out with it.”

“You really don’t get it?”

“No,” says Aomine. “Why didn’t he want to tell me?”

“He looks up to you a lot, you know,” says Satsuki.

“He used to,” says Aomine. “After third year—”

“He never stopped wanting to catch up to you. Don’t tell me you don’t see it.”

“He wants to be the ace,” says Aomine.

“He wants to be like you,” says Satsuki. “He’s not the kind of person who would say that, but—he wanted a number closest to you, and he wants to match you, and if he can’t get there yet he’ll be a close second striving for that place.”

“Oh,” says Aomine.

His stomach does a flip; this isn’t anything like Midorima having any kind of crush in return, except it kind of is? He’s not even sure how to parse it right now, but if he could hear that from Midorima’s mouth—Midorima calling him “senpai” (holy shit, he hadn’t even imagined it and now it’s so fucking appealing)—

“Dai-chan. Listen. Don’t mess it up. I know you wouldn’t on purpose, but. Just keep that in mind, okay?”

Aomine sighs.

“I’m not saying don’t do anything, but just be careful.”

Whatever the hell that means. “Okay.”

“Also,” Satsuki says, getting up to leave. “Don’t be surprised when he figures out you’re staring at him.”

“I’m subtle!”

Satsuki snorts. “You’re not subtle; Midorin’s just oblivious.”

Neither of them pitches in the intrateam scrimmage today; that’s okay. Just watching Midorima bat and play right field is enough, the perfect throws into the cutoff man and the sweet swings when he connects for a pair of doubles, one per gap—well. Aomine’s more than okay with getting used to this. And if he’s trying to match Midorima at the plate (and be a suitable role model), a double, a single, and two stolen bases of his own, well. No matter.

“Show-off,” says Satsuki. “Don’t rub it in on your own backup catcher.”

“What?” says Aomine. “It’s good practice for all of us.”

“Well,” says Satsuki. “Don’t stop trying hard when you stop trying to impress him.”

“That’s never going to happen.”

Satsuki leaves it alone after that. Coach tacks on a tenth inning even though Aomine’s team’s ahead just to get everyone an at-bat; he doesn’t pinch-hit for Aomine, though (and maybe that’s just for Ochiai on the mound). Aomine takes his time with the at-bat, watching a ball and two strikes he doesn’t like go by. He can hear Wakamatsu yelling at him to be serious from the dugout, but, well. The next pitch comes in higher than Ochiai had intended it to be, and Aomine’s being pretty damn serious when he hits it.

He takes a few steps but admires as it travels through the air, carrying through the humidity. It’s not going to be a particularly long one, but it’s probably going to get just over the right-field fence. Still counts the same as if it were two hundred meters—except when Midorima’s in right. He’s managed to get over there (God, his legs are so long, like a fucking gazelle or something) and he reaches up almost casually, doesn’t even have to jump to get it he’s so tall. Aomine nearly drops the bat. He can’t say he’s angry; that was actually a pretty fucking great catch, another thing he’s going to enjoy watching so very much (especially as a pitcher with that kind of defense backing him up).

Aomine waits for Midorima casually so they can head back to the room together; Midorima’s got some sort of postgame stretching he always does but he’s still wearing the full uniform, jersey buttoned and tucked and all (he used to do the same thing at Teikou, come to think of it).  

“That was a nice catch,” Aomine says, wanting very badly to take off Midorima’s cap, ruffle his hair again, and jam it on backwards to see the kind of fuss he’d make.

“You’re just saying that because you hit it,” says Midorima. “And it was only a scrimmage.”

“Nah, I’m saying it because it was a good hit. Which, of course, is synonymous with me hitting it, but you know?”

Midorima looks at him, lip twitching—almost there, almost a smile, the hardest thing to drag out of him but Aomine’s very much Midorima’s match in stubbornness, thank you very much. He throws an arm around Midorima’s shoulders; Midorima’s eyes widen.

“Be proud of your accomplishments, even if they don’t show up in a real game or whatever. Okay? Letting yourself be happy doesn’t mean you’re not going to go out and try just as seriously next time.”

Midorima bites his lip and nods.

“Good game, all around,” Aomine says.

“Thank you,” says Midorima. “You, too.”

And then he smiles—brief and small, but definitely a smile, and fuck. Aomine thought he’d had it bad before.

**Author's Note:**

> help i cant fucken stop


End file.
